2021 Postcolonial Love Poem, by Natalie Diaz
Ink-Light
We move within the snow-chromed world: Like-animal. Like-deer. An
alphabet. Along a street white as lamplight into the winter, walking—: like
language, a new text. I touch her with the eyes of my skin.
The way I read any beloved—: from the ramus of the left jaw down to the
cuneiform of the right foot. She isn’t so much what she is—: and becomes
herself only when added to the space where she isn’t. What is touch—: not
the touch not the hand but the white heat it floats through.
I count her my desires, mark her—: hoofprints across the frozen page. Four
strokes of dusk. Carbon black, Lamp black, Bone black, Hide glue—: I am
the alchemist of ink. She answers me, Quicksilver,
and the noise of her boots upon the snow is the weight of a night bird
bending the meteor-blue branch fruiting white flames of cotton. Each of
her steps, an allograph—: bird, flexed limb, perfect line of vertebrae, the
glyph of my pelvis.
When I put my teeth to her wrist, the world goes everywhere white. Not
sound but the dizzying nautilus of what is both the palm and the ear. I
invented her hand in this texture—: a grapheme.
In me, a feeling—: white blossom with a red-sided icosahedron inside the
velveteen car of a gold train vibrating the violet tunnel of my throat on its
way to a dimmed station in my chest—: twenty seats of desire, and I am
sitting in each one.
I burn on the silver sparks of her breath moving out of her body. The miracle.
No. The power and the glory glory glory of her—: she breathes. Out—: Out—:
twenty red seats of desire, I break every one. A series of waves against ham-
mer anvil stirrup—: a vibration of light I can hold with my mouth.
Commentary- This I call brave writing. She writes how she wants, despite the average person possibly being unable to fully comprehend. And it’s a lesbian love poem. Not only are the images fantastic, but so are the deep, powerful feelings she has. She captures the magic of the snowy landscape at a certain time of day and all the nature and is one with her partner.
As a Native-American, many poems allude to her culture and beliefs. The other poems are also powerfully written. It takes a long time to develop one’s craft as she did. Great writing.
My opinion: 9/10
2022 frank:sonnets, by Dianne Seuss
forthcoming
2023 Then the War: And Selected Poems, 2007-2020, by Carl Philips
In a Low Voice, Slowly
So stubborn, and as if almost necessary, this
little wind, playing the leaves, their surfaces, playing
the leaves where they lie fallen, while not once
rearranging them. Like being asked what, if anything,
do you regret at this point; and, as answer, shaping
your own smallish song around how knowing isn’t
understanding, isn’t mystery either, which isn’t un-knowing,
not exactly, more like deciding to turn abruptly
east after so many years westering, what kind of answer
was that? Sometimes the past seems the stuff of heraldry,
figures proper on a ground of good and evil. Other times
the past sways ocean-like above me. There’s a sound
deer still make when in sixes they come down
from the hills at sunrise, the kind of sunrise where
no sun’s visible, but it’s daylight, and just the rain, and
the deer passing like their own form of light though it;
their hooves mark the damp ground incidentally,
no particular meaning. It’s true that love marks the body.
Commentary- Don’t get frustrated trying to figure this out. Just let the images sink in and use your intuition to elicit some sense, some meaning, some feeling. Read it a few times. The wind is making a sound with the leaves, and it’s like being asked about regrets, and what you did with your life. The reality at the time changes in the mind later on. And these ghostly deer, do they represent loved ones? Are you on the ground, dead?
His other poems are like this, combinations of ideas that work together to make impressions and suggestions and their own unique responses in each reader. Pretty impressive what he pulled off. Unique, deep, challenging.
My opinion: 8/10 only because it takes too long to feel enjoyment
2024 Tripas:Poems, by Brandon Som
forthcoming
2025 New and Selected Poems, by Marie Howe
Before
The boulder once dust, will be dust again,
but today, so filled with its own heaviness,
it can’t hear the grunts of the men who push and roll it
to the mouth of the tomb,
and it can’t yet conceive how else it might be moved.
Commentary- I think of the above poem as a religious one—on who pushed the boulder that covered the tomb of Jesus. It speaks of everything as temporary, but the teachings of Jesus are eternal. Jesus spoke about how we live and making sense of hardships and forgiveness. What else is there? Those who rolled it need to ask, as do we, who know not what we do. What’s your take on the poem?
Howe’s collection I appreciated and found satisfying. A few times I said Wow to myself while reading. I’m not compelled to read all of her stuff, Howe-ever. Maybe it’s my personality. But, I love what she got me to think about. Her craft seems simple and heavy at the same time. You have to sit with the poems, especially when ideas seem abstract.
My opinion: 7/10, though that could go up if I reread the book.
2026 Ars Poeticas, by Juliana Spahr
from Bison
When the bison wallows,
it is not just that the dust rises up.
The soil compacts, hair and oil mix in it,
eventually there is a deep impression,
one that fills with water when the rains come.
Then an impossible art results,
the bison way of making things right
for the feathery leaves of the yarrow,
the purple- or pink-tinted stalks of the field milk vetch,
the stalkless flowers of the cushion phlox,
and the wispy pink plumes of the prairie smoke.
Tall bluebells too, pendant bell-shaped,
next to the simple yellow flowers of the alpine arnica.
The bison way of making things right
for the wooly gray leaves of the fringed sage,
right too for the sage’s small and unremarkable fruits.
Right for the roots of the Jerusalem artichokes,
the prairie turnip and the prairie parsley.
Right for the prairie chicken.
The bison way of making things right for the male
to come hooting, dancing, tail up,
neck sacks inflated all the while.
Right for the western chorus frogs
that come out at night to chorus and feed.
Right for the high jumping northern cricket frog.
Right for the small invertebrates and arthropods
upon which they feed. The sap-feeding herbivores
with their beak mouthpart sucking on plant fluid.
The chewing herbivores with their
mandibulate mouthparts. And those that
carnivorously feed on a variety of prey.
Right also for the grasshopper sparrow, also feeding,
and then creating a well-concealed open cup
on the ground under the tall stalks of the big bluestem,
the shorter ones of the little bluestem,
the switchgrass and the Indian grass too.
Commentary- Love that classic vernacular using unique and obscure words to evoke beauty and a particular sound: “field milk vetch,” “cushion phlox,” “alpine arnica.” She just nails it. Really nice collection of poetry by a very sensitive, caring, and educated person. Her politics aside, love what she has to say.
My opinion: 8.5/10